


The Westermarck Exception

by JustinianAugustus



Category: A Series of Unfortunate Events - Lemony Snicket
Genre: Angst, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Other characters mentioned - Freeform, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-12
Updated: 2018-04-12
Packaged: 2019-04-22 03:23:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 945
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14299707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JustinianAugustus/pseuds/JustinianAugustus
Summary: Cabin fever can send you strange revelations. Especially when you're stuck on a submarine one loose bolt from a graveyard with just your siblings at your side.(set at the end of Grim Grotto)





	The Westermarck Exception

On the sixth day there was a leak in the aft water main, above their sleeping quarters, and Klaus woke to the thought of death. Not the thought, so much, as the realization; not _memento mori_ , as the wrought-iron gates of Prufrock Prep decreed, but _ecce mori_.  
When he realized, Violet sobbing, Sunny crying out from afar, that it was not a hull breach but a mere error of plumbing, it was as if he remained ‘dead’ regardless. From that moment on, Klaus was a wraith, a phantom haunting a ghost ship with his undead siblings.  
Where each preceding night had seen him nearly sleepless, agonizing the groans and turns of their decaying vessel, counting each successive moment as a final vesper, this newfound acceptance allowed him to doze like a baby.

The _Queequeg_ could implode at any second, really. With a crew of two-and-a-half children, the rusted coffin kept drifting further into decay, despite fourteen hour shifts of sweat and grease from Violet and all the technical reading Klaus could manage until sleep took him standing. But now, after that baptismal wakeup of water pouring down onto his bed sheets and emaciated body, he had come to terms with it. He was post-mortal.

When they first abandoned Briny Beach, seeking out a life away from all the lies and secrets and waiting taxis of VFD, Klaus hadn’t dared to take Captain Widdershins’ empty bedroom for fear of the glass porthole dominating the wall. With his newfound clairvoyance, the wide mattress and embroidered quilts looked quite tempting vis-à-vis the sopping remains of his old quarters.  
Klaus was hardly surprised when Violet too showed up at the door in a faded lilac nightgown (they had decided to stop wearing the diving suits, finally) and murmured of having put Sunny to bed. Without needing an invitation she shut the door behind her and joined him in bed, draping a frail arm over his shoulders in a mix of guarding and resignation. As he took off his glasses for the night, he could see it clear as day. If the Baudelaires could be most-mortal, they could be post-moral.

How many times had Violet gotten dressed beside him, in the Poes’ nauseating sweaters, in Olaf’s lacey gowns, in school uniforms and hand-me-downs and sundresses and cardigans? Or when they shared a body in the circus, the times he would frown and blush and tell her he had to use the bathroom and she’d look away but not quite? The nights when rocked by the hammock and Kevin’s snores they’d drift in and out to the tune of each others’ warmth? It was only then that his endless dreams of matchsticks and arson were extinguished — a tale with no happy beginning, no happy ending, and not many happy things in between, yet Klaus knew Violet was one of them.

“Do you still think my glasses are ridiculous?” he asked, recalling one of their few fights since their parents died. It had been in the Village of Fowl Devotees, and Klaus had started it, venting his frustrations on his sister.

“I never did,” Violet replied calmly. “Do you still think my ribbon is silly?”

“I think it’s beautiful,” he confessed. His conciliatory mood spurred him to clarify something else he had shied from in the recent past:  
“You know, in the caravan, when I thought we were going to die, the last thing I wanted to tell you was that I loved you. I love you.”  
He corrected the tense of his final statement, as if it were some tantric prayer that required flawless recitation to have effect.

Violet repeated it back to him. Or did she? Maybe Klaus just imagined it again as she kissed his temple and ran a finger through his ashen hair. Her hands, so delicate, had been ground into cuts and callouses by her work, but Klaus didn’t mind. He took one, laid it upon his lips as if to balance it.

Though Klaus couldn’t admit it at the time, he had been quite jealous when Quigley entered the picture, walking from the grave like Lazarus to claim his sister within an hour of unmasking himself.  
How Violet had rebuked and cross-examined Fiona at the slightest signs of attraction, when she herself had shuffled off to french-kiss Quigley with his introduction still warm on his lips! Klaus wasn’t sure exactly what they did on that frozen waterfall, truth be told, and he didn’t care to think about it. This time, Klaus too was back from the dead to tell her everything, tell her all.

Under the nicotine green of the seawater, _little death_ unto _little death_ they spun. Pulling off her gown in silence he found acres of skin, dark circles sweeping under her eyes, lashes so weary they scarcely seemed to hover over sleep. She became his ministering angel.

“We can’t…” she lied, obligatory.

It felt awkward and clumsy and half-realized, yet that made it all the more natural and alluring.

“We shouldn’t,” she recanted.

As the reality of what they were doing washed over her, Violet doubted any physical experience could lie beyond this, for there was nothing she could possibly hold back. Her brother already had it all. Each pleasure was a hall of mirrors without end; Baudelaires stretching to infinity, recursive lust and satisfaction, throes of ecstasy disappearing at some unseen horizon beyond which they became too small to detect. Quantum love. Foam of sighs. Heisenberg Uncertainty Passion.

The submarine was a lost cause, yes, but they could ride it to the end. So too was their love. It was both a particle and a wave. Right and wrong. Alive and dead.

**Author's Note:**

> Plunging back into ASOUE after well over a decade, I was amazed to see how few Violet/Klaus fics there were. I’ll probably return to this fascinating ship later but for now I just wanted to get something out there.


End file.
